Paul Allen, one of Microsoft's co-founders who left the company long ago, has posted on his blog about his experiences with Windows 8. He (surprise) likes it, but he does note a number of shortcomings and oddities - all of which are spot-on. However, he fails to address the core issue with Windows 8: it's forcing users to drill a small hole in the wall with a belt sander.

Thom, Which settings are accessible only through the classic desktop, and which of those are users likely to need to access?

I ask only because I've been using almost exclusively the classic desktop since the developer preview came out, and anything I need to change I've avoided doing it via Metro.

Also, I think that my exclusive use of classic is why I like 8 so much, and why I installed the RTM as soon as I was able to get my hand on it. If you focus on classic, there really aren't any significant differences, but those things that are different are improvements worth having.